IOWA, ABIDING PLACE OF PLENTY
Photograph by A. M. Wettach
THOUGH IOWA IS TRACTOR-MINDED, THE MULE STILL HAS HIS PLACE
This sturdy colt, only three months old, shows by his size, build, light muzzle, and tufted ears
that he is one of which his owner, Perl Spurgeons of Davis County, may be proud. The largest
corn farm in Iowa, a 6,400-acre tract in Sac County, has elaborate machine equipment but is mule
operated except in emergency (page 179).
have played an important part in the de
velopment of Iowa. The Methodist Church
has founded or assisted six: Iowa Wesleyan
at Mount Pleasant; Cornell at Mount Ver
non; Morningside at Sioux City; Upper
Iowa at Fayette; Simpson at Indianola,
and John Fletcher at University Park in
Oskaloosa. Opened in 1844, Iowa Wes
leyan is the oldest college in the State.
Columbia, for men, and Clarke, for
women, in Dubuque and St. Ambrose in
Davenport are Catholic colleges of excel
lent standing. At Pella is Central College,
built by Baptists in 1853 but now under
the auspices of the Dutch Reformed Church.
The Society of Friends maintains William
Penn College at Oskaloosa, the Disciples of
Christ sponsored Drake University in Des
Moines, the Lutheran Church has Luther
College at Decorah, and the Evangelical
Church conducts Western Union at Le
Mars. Although now nonsectarian, Grin
nell has a Congregationalist background.
Missionaries graduated from these schools
have carried Iowa culture to the far places
of the world, and there is hardly an outpost
of civilization that has not felt the influence
of earnest Christians from the "Bible Belt."
Grant Wood, Iowa artist best known for
his American Gothic and Dinnerfor Thresh
ers, has done much of his work in Cedar
Rapids. In the dining room of our hotel
we saw several of his murals, and in the
Memorial Building a stained-glass window
he designed. Thirty of his early canvases
are permanently hung in the reception
room of a mortuary at the rear of which is
Turner Alley, the hayloft workshop where
he painted them.
The Quaker Oats plant, one of the largest
cereal mills in the world, has seven concrete
elevators with a total storage capacity of
9,500,000 bushels. After being weighed,
sorted, and cleaned, the oats are hulled,
treated with violet rays, passed through
steam chests, crushed to flakes by slowly